Project 64 Emulator: Serious Performance Complications

[8DXD8]

I've been tinkering away with my Project 64 emulator for a while now, but haven't been able to overcome the various performance issues it seems to have when running off of my laptop! First of all, various ROMs that I've tested out, such as F-Zero X and Starfox 64 ( among others ) , have SEVERE choppy sound and framerate issues that randomly come and go in spurts while I'm playing said games. No matter how many times I've attempted to remedy this issue in the various graphical/sound settings available, nothing seems to make the slightest difference!

Other ROMs, such as Diddy Kong Racing, seem to take it a step further and crash at random points during the emulation, bringing up an error message that says, "While processing graphics data an exception occurred, you may need to restart the emulator". This event appears to happen at random moments too, but it's almost guaranteed to occur eventually during certain periods of play.


The current graphics plugin I'm using is 'Jabo's Direct3D8 1.6' and the sound plugin I'm using is 'Jabo's DirectSound 1.6'. Is there anything that I can possibly do in order to alleviate these troublesome performance issues? Are there extra files that need to be downloaded in order to reinforce the quality of this emulator?




Just in case it's needed, here is the model name for the laptop I am currently running the Project 64 emulator off of: 'Presario CQ56 Notebook PC'

[Ness]

Download Project 64 1.7 that is hosted on Emuparadise's main website, then use the default plugins that come with it, you are most likely using an out-dated version.

Note that Starfox and F-Zero X are almost always choppy unless you are on a high-end system.

[8DXD8]

Just out of curiosity, what would a "high-end system" entail in this situation? Are there any add-ons that I could possibly download/purchase in order to somewhat improve these nagging issues?

Or is this just a common inconvenience that N64-players are going to have to deal with until future iterations of this emulator come to light?

[Polizzi]

Common inconvenience. I only play a select few games but I've noticed that other games probably have a report by the game title in the emulator window.

[Zaladane]

Just out of curiosity, what would a "high-end system" entail in this situation? Are there any add-ons that I could possibly download/purchase in order to somewhat improve these nagging issues?

Or is this just a common inconvenience that N64-players are going to have to deal with until future iterations of this emulator come to light?

Your computer is perfectly fine for running N64 emulation even for goldeneye, it's just a matter of tinkering with settings. And yes there are some games that will always give you problems no matter what. It is a good idea to go with PJ64 1.7 Personally I've had no trouble with the games you mentioned, I'll look up my settings and post next time I'm on if someone hasn't gotten around to it as I'm not on much these days. In the meantime you could post what your settings actually are. Remember too that there's also advanced settings and settings you can control by right clicking on the name of the rom when it's in the list for choosing.

[MaslowK]

Just out of curiosity, what would a "high-end system" entail in this situation? Are there any add-ons that I could possibly download/purchase in order to somewhat improve these nagging issues?

Or is this just a common inconvenience that N64-players are going to have to deal with until future iterations of this emulator come to light?

Considering I'm running PJ64 1.6 with the default plugins and playing Starfox 64 etc with no real performance issues (and, this is on a laptop from 2004) I would say it's not your computer. However, as it "is" a laptop there's a chance it's set to throttle your CPU to save power; I had the same issue, and even "low end" N64 games struggled.

Go to your control panel and click the Power Options icon. Under Power Schemes, click the drop down menu and select Home/Office desk. Unless your BIOS settings are somehow overriding these settings, it should set your laptop to use your full CPU all the time, rather than throttling it based on what you're running.

As far as the emulator itself is concerned, at the top of the main window, click Options, then click Configure Graphics Plugin. Set Fullscreen Resolution to 800x600, Full Screen Sync to Transfer memory and make sure the slider next to Anisotropic filtering is set all the way to the left at Off. Uncheck Super2xSal Textures if it is checked.

Personally I have found no significant performance difference between PJ64 1.6 and 1.7. You're welcome to try 1.7 if you'd like though.

Another thing you may look into is seeing if there are any updated drivers for your graphics controller. To find these you could either search for your laptop on the manufacturers website, or search specifically for your graphics controller on google, i.e., "*insert name of controller here* drivers"; the easiest way to see the name of the one you have would be to download & install GPU-Z, which can be found here; http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/SysInfo/GPU-Z/

[Iamerror]

I have a problem with choppiness too. I don't play many games on it because of the choppiness.

[Ness]

Here, These are 2 good plugins to use. I'd also suggest using PJ64 1.7.

Copy and paste them into your plugin folder.

I can't figure out how to put an attachment in a post so...

http://uploading.com/files/56b22337/Plugins.rar/

[Sheik]

Here, These are 2 good plugins to use. I'd also suggest using PJ64 1.7.

Copy and paste them into your plugin folder.

I can't figure out how to put an attachment in a post so...

http://uploading.com/files/56b22337/Plugins.rar/

Don't mean to be a Dick, but Project 1.7 is indefinitely in beta stage, bound to be more problems than 1.6
I'd use PJ64 1.6 with GlideHQ, with others remaining as default settings.

[Ness]

Don't mean to be a Dick, but Project 1.7 is indefinitely in beta stage, bound to be more problems than 1.6
I'd use PJ64 1.6 with GlideHQ, with others remaining as default settings.

It's in beta, but it still works way better than 1.6... Just so you know.

[MaslowK]

It's in beta, but it still works way better than 1.6... Just so you know.

And 1.6 still runs exactly the same as 1.7 on my computer... Just so you know. It's clearly not universally better.

[Ness]

Play Goldeneye on 1.6, then play it on 1.7 on a low end computer like mine, extremely noticeable difference.

[MaslowK]

Play Goldeneye on 1.6, then play it on 1.7 on a low end computer like mine

computer like mine

like mine

My computer isn't particularly high end either. And I still see no difference between the two playing when Goldeneye. Again, that says 1.7 isn't universally better. This and the fact that it's still in beta tells me to recommend 1.6 before recommending 1.7.

/thread

[Sheik]

/thread

[MaslowK]

I'm afraid rofl'ing will not help OPs PJ64 performance